


Antichrist-mas Carol

by the_moonmoth



Series: Chaos Theory [3]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Adam gets to be The Good Boyfriend in this one, Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Issues, Found Family, Home for Christmas, Homophobia, M/M, The Dowlings Are Terrible Parents, Transphobia, and Adam's going right alongside him, but Warlock's on a journey my loves, learning to set boundaries with your parents is a life skill, there is no catharsis when your family is shit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:01:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28418778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_moonmoth/pseuds/the_moonmoth
Summary: “And this must be Adam.” His mom recovered first. “Warlock, honey, why don’t you take your things upstairs and give your friend the tour. He’s in the bluebell bedroom.”Friend, Warlock thought.Different bedrooms. Of course.
Relationships: Warlock Dowling/Adam Young
Series: Chaos Theory [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1541605
Comments: 96
Kudos: 278
Collections: Ixnael’s Recommendations, Ixnael’s SFW corner





	Antichrist-mas Carol

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is part of the Chaos Theory universe, set about a year and a half after An Antichrist Walks Into a Bar and Babel (yes, that latter one is still a WIP, I’m sorry about my brain). No spoilers for Babel except that Adam and the godfathers do eventually become a significant part of Warlock's life.
> 
> I’ve wanted to write this fic since I first started An Antichrist Walks Into a Bar, but last year I was all tied up with the big bang, so I have done my darnedest to get it out during this plague-filled holiday season instead. Read the tags and stay safe, darlings (and if your family is at all like Warlock’s, enjoy the excuse to be absent this year…)

**An Antichrist-mas Carol**

Adam hadn’t expected to feel this nervous. He hadn’t expected to feel nervous at all. Part of the whole Antichrist package was the sixth sense he’d always had that let him _see_ people -- see who they really were, figure out what they wanted with the same ease as breathing ( _to control them_ the dark kernel that sat behind his ribs agreed, but it was crushed so far down within him these days he didn’t have to listen to it, just a pinprick singularity he’d carefully layered the other parts of himself around). And yet, here they were, crunching over the gravel to the imposing doorway of the Dowlings’ Wiltshire estate, and Warlock, without even noticing, had let go of his hand. Adam glanced over at the hunched shoulders and jagged elbows of him, dressed as conservatively as Adam had ever seen him in unripped grey jeans and a black boat-neck jumper, face free of make up, and couldn’t help but be affected by his crackling anxiety.

At the front step, Warlock rang the doorbell, and they waited for a whole blessed ice age for it to be answered. Literal tectonic plates moved more quickly. And beside him, Warlock jangled like one big giant nerve. 

Adam took a deep, slow breath, and then took Warlock’s hand, threading their fingers together. “I could... I could make it so this goes smoothly,” he said.

Warlock darted a glance at him the way he always did whenever Adam let himself be anything less than self-assured, far more fond these days than it used to be, and way less sharp. He smiled a quick, grim little smile, and squeezed Adam’s fingers. “I wish I could say yes.” 

Adam nodded, relieved. It was always a relief when someone turned him down. He didn’t know why he had to keep asking, hadn’t figured that out yet, but it was always worse with people he cared about. He hadn’t told Warlock about that yet, though. Wasn’t actually sure if he could. Like, physically could. Like some fairytale curse. Maybe he just needed to try harder, because he hadn’t tried all that hard so far, but now certainly wasn’t the time.

“Thanks anyway,” Warlock said, and drew his hand up to press a quick kiss to the back of his knuckles.

Adam allowed himself a minute shuffle of his feet. “Yeah, no. Any time.”

He was just meeting his boyfriend’s parents. There was no reason to feel like this. He’d personally faced down Satan. This was no big deal at all.

And yet.

*

As they stared down the ornately carved door to his parents’ house, Warlock reflected on what the fuck he and Adam were doing here. Last year he’d come by himself, and it had been just as awful as he should’ve known it would be but had forgotten to expect. Last year, things with Adam had still been tenuous and new -- nowhere near meeting the parents territory. Especially not Warlock’s parents. This year… Well. When he’d told them he’d be bringing his boyfriend, he’d more than half-expected them to tell him not to bother. But it’d been his mom on the phone (it was always his mom) and she’d steamrolled right over him just like she always did, insisted they both come, and so here they were.

And there _they_ were, standing in the middle of the entrance hall, waiting amid a sea of Christmas bling for Saddleworth the butler to usher them over. It was so sodding staged Warlock wanted to crawl inside his own skin. 

“Honey,” his mother crooned, just as his dad boomed, “Son!” And then, as their eyes tracked over to Adam to make their pre-prepared pleasantries to him, there was a sudden and very awkward pause as they both noticed Adam and Warlock’s clasped hands at the same time.

“And this must be Adam.” His mom recovered first. “Warlock, honey, why don’t you take your things upstairs and give your friend the tour. He’s in the bluebell bedroom.”

 _Friend_ , Warlock thought. _Different bedrooms. Of course._

“Sure, Mom,” he said, and then winced immediately, biting his lip. He hated when his American accent slipped out, like really truly _loathed_ it, and it was always worse in this place. God. Fuck. Three days, two nights. He could do this. And then he could leave as fast as his boyfriend’s vintage Mini would carry them.

*

“Your room,” Warlock said tersely at the first door they came to. Adam huffed an ironic laugh and let himself in to drop his bag on the end of the bed. It was covered in an American-style quilt, all twee flowers and chintz, very wholesome, and the subtle messaging wasn’t lost on him. No naughty business was to happen in this room, nothing unseemly. They’d called him Warlock’s friend and put them in different rooms like a sword down the middle. Adam was well aware that there were people in the world who considered that kind of coy evasion of reality to be quaint, but Adam knew quaint. Aziraphale was quaint. This was weird and controlling. And Adam knew weird and controlling, too. From the inside out. 

“Wardrobe,” Warlock continued, pointing. “En suite. That phone’ll put you through to the kitchen or the butler’s station.”

Adam blinked at the casual way Warlock just _mentioned_ the kind of luxury that got you instant attention or whatever food you fancied, but didn’t manage to get a word in before Warlock was brushing back past him into the corridor. 

“Guest room, guest room,” he listed off as they walked past more doors. “Linen closet, butler’s staircase, master bedroom, my room.”

Adam watched as Warlock pushed the door open unceremoniously with his boot and tossed his bag inside, then shoved his hands into his pockets, pointy elbows spiked out like some defensive sea creature. He was already out in the corridor when he stopped, turned around, and went back to open the door fully.

“What is it?” Adam asked, slipping a hand around his waist. Sullen moods and over-caffeinated anxiety, Adam was used to -- didn’t like it, but knew how to respond. Warlock tightening the reins on his usual flow of obscenity-ridden backchat to descend into grunty monosyllables was a pretty bad sign. Standing on the threshold of his own bedroom, arms hanging limply at his sides, saying nothing at all, was… really kind of worrying. “Warlock?”

“It’s…” Warlock started, but his voice was oddly thick and he had to stop and swallow before continuing. “She redecorated.”

Like a man walking through water, Warlock stepped inside. Adam followed. Adam always followed.

The room was… nice? In the same bland kind of way as the word ‘nice’ itself. It wouldn’t have been out of place in a hotel. Tastefully nondescript. Neutral colours on the bed and walls, an inoffensive pop of colour from a hanging print and an accent chair in one corner that could well have come from IKEA.

Warlock had liked books as a child, had collected cheap plastic dinosaurs and old-fashioned CDs, had once nurtured succulents in little terracotta pots and stuck glow-in-the-dark stars across his ceiling; Adam knew all of that and saw none of it in this room. He thought of his own bedroom at his parents’ house, the strata of his life untouched, allowed to build up around him like a comfortable shell, or perhaps a firm foundation -- favourite childhood toys mixed in with broken protractors and piles of magazines from Anathema’s latest passion project. Posters and pressed flowers, marbles and mementos from his travels. There was none of that here. Warlock’s home up to age eighteen had disappeared under magnolia walls and generic artwork, as though the things he liked, that made him _him_ , were too unsavoury to be preserved. 

And there was a thing. Adam did his best to try to understand what it must have been like growing up in a family like Warlock’s. He had a powerful imagination, after all, and a great deal of motivation, but Warlock had always been different, opaque to Adam’s senses somehow, and besides all that, even Adam had his limits. The truth was he hadn’t been able to get his head round it, not really; his relationship with his own parents had its ups and downs, but they had always been loving in their own ways. Just now, downstairs, he’d noticed the cool welcome, the hand shake where his dad would've hugged him, the dutiful kiss on the cheek where his mum would've showered him. Warlock didn't always like a lot of physical contact -- Adam had wondered briefly if maybe they were just being respectful of that. But then there was the way they'd looked at Adam, hesitating before deciding how welcome he would be in their home. And then there was ‘friend’. And now they were standing in Warlock's childhood bedroom, completely stripped of anything he might’ve called his, and the look on Warlock's face...

He was standing still and silent in the middle of all that, in the way that Adam hated most, looking grave and stoic and absolutely devastated, and Adam reflexively shut down the dark heart of himself before it could even stir because he knew… he _knew..._

And then, of course, there were the clothes laid out on the bed.

*

“What on earth is this?” Adam asked him, prodding at the white shirt, charcoal suit, silvery grey tie laid out crisply across Warlock’s bed. 

“Mum’s idea of appropriate clothing,” Warlock muttered. They were smart and fashionable and young-looking, and Warlock hated everything about them. “I’m having flashbacks to Sixth Form.”

“Once again, I have so many questions,” Adam said, but he was only briefly side-tracked, until Warlock pulled his jumper over his head with perfunctory bitterness.

“Wait, you’re not actually going to wear them?” And for a moment, just a fraction of a second, something dangerous flickered across Adam’s face and in the air around them. 

“It’s easier not to get into a fight about it,” Warlock said tiredly. “And I don’t want to fight with you, either.”

The tension went out of the air. “No, of course you don’t,” Adam said, with that studied gentleness of his, that kindness he had picked out and chosen to wear like his favourite mac. Warlock looked at the jumper clenched between his hands. Black mohair, a little glittery -- found on the womenswear floor of M&S. 

Gender was a construct. He'd overheard some drunk girl saying that angrily to someone at the Student Union back in Fresher's Week, and though he'd never thought of it in exactly those terms, the words had resonated somewhere within him with a simplistic sort of rightness. That week, he’d realised suddenly that he could buy his own clothes, could wear what he liked, could be _himself._ The first time ever. And he had. And he hadn’t looked back. He held the jumper to his chest and leaned into Adam helplessly.

"We don't have to stay," Adam said softly into his hair. "Warlock, we could just leave." And oh, he wanted to. Run away back to Brighton. Fuck, cut off ties completely. Never come back here. But his parents knew _so many people_. Their reach was so far, the effort it would take so great.

"Not worth it," Warlock sighed. "Let's just get it over with, then we can go back to ignoring them for another year."

*

“You need a haircut,” was Mr. Dowling’s opening salvo when they went down for dinner. “No one’ll ever take you seriously if you look like a girl.”

There were so many things wrong with that, Adam assumed Warlock’s silence was down to his brain tripping over all the possible comebacks. Nothing came, though, and he looked to his boyfriend, trying to gauge his own response by Warlock’s. He was waiting, he realised, for the acerbic retort, the _fuck off with your wrong opinions_ attitude, and instead he was witnessing Warlock gritting his teeth and forcing out a non-confrontational, “Maybe after New Year’s.”

“Wouldn’t want to put you out,” Thaddeus said with what he clearly assumed to be good natured exasperation. He followed it up with a particularly egregious shoulder-clap before turning to the bar and pouring himself a generous whiskey. “Just make sure it gets done before the internship interviews start.”

The investment banking internships that Warlock had less than zero interest in. 

“I like your hair,” Adam said to Warlock, more quietly than he wanted to but unwilling to stoke the argument Warlock clearly wanted to avoid.

“I know,” Warlock replied, just as quietly. He’d worn it down, which was apparently the less offensive option, and when he reached up to nervously tuck a strand behind his ear, Adam’s throat tightened painfully.

“Thought we could go fishing tomorrow down at the trout stream,” Thaddeus continued. “Get out from underfoot, make a _lads’_ day out of it.” He looked inordinately pleased with himself for having used the native terminology. “You fish, Adam?”

“Now and then,” Adam said. He personally quite liked the meditative calm of sitting on a river bank with a thermos of tea and a packed lunch (Aziraphale made a _fantastic_ packed lunch). The fishing rod was incidental. But he could tell that wasn’t the kind of fishing Thaddeus was alluding to -- the man oozed competitiveness from every pore. And besides: “Warlock doesn’t, though.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” the man said jovially. “Of course he does.”

“I _can_ ,” Warlock said, in the mildest tones Adam had ever heard his boyfriend use. “But you know I don’t enjoy it.”

Thaddeus’s smile didn’t exactly freeze, he was too good a politician for that, but it took on an edge nonetheless. “How about you make an exception for your old man once in a while?” he said, which was a bit rich, given how little leeway he was determined to give Warlock.

“Honey, let’s not argue on Warlock’s first night home,” Harriet said, appearing at his elbow. Next to Adam, Warlock snorted ever so softly, and Adam could practically hear him thinking _no, save that for the second night._

“What do you plan to do then, eh?” Thaddeus rallied smoothly. “Can’t mope around all day with your earphones in with a guest here.”

“Sorry Mr. Dowling,” Adam cut in with all of the earnestness his rural Oxfordshire upbringing could bring to bear. “Warlock’s been talking about the gardens here for as long as I've known him, and I made him promise to show me around tomorrow.”

Thaddeus looked a little taken aback, caught in a confusion of flattery and wounded pride, and ended up making an ominous prediction about the weather cutting short their enjoyment, which was nonsensical, because it wasn't like fishing was an indoor sport, but it brought the conversation around neatly to something he'd been intensely curious about.

“It’s the funniest thing,” Adam said. “But my godfather used to work here, as a gardener. Francis Fell?”

“Oh, Brother Francis!” Harriet said, face immediately transformed by genuine fondness for the first time since they’d arrived. “Oh those were good years, weren’t they, Tad? He and Nanny Ashtoreth were so wonderful with Warlock.”

Well that was interesting. Now that they were thinking about it, Adam could see the imprint of many, many miracles (both angelic and demonic) flickering around the pair, but none of them were intended to alter their memories to _that_ extent. Then it hit him that those were the years they had most been able to farm out the childcare. The years Warlock had been most loved and secure, and therefore the easiest to deal with. The years they saw him least. And suddenly his interest in prying some amusing anecdotes out of them vanished.

“Did you know Francis and Nanny left together?” Warlock asked, apparently more prepared than Adam was to poke the bruise.

“I always suspected,” Harriet said, with an indulgent smile. “Those two. Nanny was always so severe, except when she was with him. Then she seemed to just…” she gestured vaguely.

Warlock smiled, too. With teeth. “Well, Mom, you should know that Nanny’s changed his pronouns.”

“What?” said Thaddeus, looking thoroughly confused. “Changed his-- her-- why would you--?”

“Isn’t it nice to have an open fire?” Harriet cut over him. “Why don’t we all go sit by it.”

After that, there were drinks and stilted small talk that more often than not felt like a polite interrogation, but despite an awkward moment when the Dowlings said grace over dinner, they made it through with minimal damage. Adam couldn’t keep his eyes away from Warlock, though, and not in the good way. The suit he’d stuffed himself into was a good fit, the white shirt a striking contrast to his preferred dark palette -- it made Warlock look handsome and normal and _wrong_.

“Can’t wait to get you out of that thing,” Adam whispered, leaning close between courses, and Warlock shot him a tight little smirk. It was nothing, just one small moment of many between boyfriends -- they didn’t even touch -- but when Adam sat back, both Dowlings were watching them with frozen smiles.

*

Warlock watched the clock, counting down the minutes between the coffee and mints being served, and when he and Adam would be able to make an exit without incurring comment. It was a complicated equation, depending on a number of variables, such as how much each of his parents had had to drink, how many times his mother had looked at her phone, and whether his father was in a story telling mood, but Warlock had got this down to a fine art during his teenage years. So when he and Adam stood to make their brief goodnights, and his mother yawned ostentatiously behind her hand and said she was rather tired herself and would go up with them, the cringe that went through him was a full-body sensation.

They stopped at the door to Adam’s room. His mom had walked on ahead, but instead of going into the master suite, was hovering out in the hall apparently swiping her finger along a picture frame to check for dust. Warlock stared at Adam’s shoulder, ashamed of his family and the way he was when he was with them. Ashamed that they hadn’t even invited Adam to call them by their first names, and that Warlock was apparently willing to put up with it for the sake of a quiet life. That Adam was seeing it, all of it, and would never unsee it.

“Sorry,” he whispered.

Adam didn’t reply immediately, a searching silence in which Warlock could feel the weight of his regard, even though he still could not look up. Eventually, he said quietly, “S’okay,” and went into the guest room.

He passed his mother on the way to his own room (or, really, the guest room they were currently pretending was still his), and her smile as she said goodnight was an unbearable mix of not-under-my-roof triumph and this-is-for-your-own-good solicitousness. Like she could somehow know what was best for him without actually knowing a single thing about him, by -- what? -- sheer dint of biological association? Fuck that.

Warlock got undressed and brushed his teeth and lay in bed wishing he were home, back at their little flat in Brighton with the sea view and the rent they couldn’t technically afford. Bringing Adam here had been a mistake. He was so bloody selfish, he’d wanted the moral support, but seeing Adam subjected to this infantile white-washing of their relationship was just painful. His phone vibrated but he ignored it. There was no one he wanted to talk to right now except Adam, and nothing he could say to Adam that would make anything better. So he simply lay there and stared uselessly at the ceiling and fantasised about all the things he’d say to his parents if he was brave enough to burn his bridges. It was impossible, they were his _parents_ for fuck’s sake, he couldn’t just… _do_ that. But it didn’t stop him wishing.

He was in some kind of Zen state of despair when he heard the voices.

“Are you lost, son?”

Oh crap, oh fuck, that was his father out on the landing, and only one person in the entire house he could be talking to. He shrank down under the covers in preemptive embarrassment over the confrontation that was about to happen.

A moment later, he reflected that he should’ve had more faith in Adam, because when had his boyfriend ever opted _not_ to eviscerate someone with the truth? 

“No, Mr. Dowling, I’m going to sleep in Warlock’s room. With Warlock. I would ask if that’s all right with you, but seeing as this is Warlock’s home too, I don’t actually think I need your permission.”

(Not that he usually did it on purpose, it was just... how he was. This, though -- this had malicious intent written all over it, and it made Warlock all warm and strange in his soft underbelly.)

He heard his father stammering in outrage, and Adam’s light footsteps continuing towards his door without waiting for a response. 

“Hey,” Adam said as he slipped in, and Warlock had never loved him more. “They do know we sleep together when we’re not under their roof, right?” 

Warlock spluttered over a laugh that was threatening the hysterical. “I don’t think anyone’s had sex under this roof since I was conceived… well, maybe Saddleworth, I bet he could get it.”

Adam stared at him, aghast, “He’s got to be nearly 70!” 

”72 actually,” Warlock said, flipping the corner of the blanket up for Adam to climb in. "But it's not like we don't know anyone older." They arranged themselves for a moment or two, Warlock bunching his knees up as tight as he could into Adam's side, before settling into a comfortable silence. But, “It’s not my home.”

“What?”

“You said this was my home, too. It’s not.”

Adam pulled him closer, possessive in the best kind of way. “I know. But they don’t want to admit it, so why not use it against them?”

 _You’re sexy when you use your powers for evil,_ Warlock almost said, the urge to hide behind an off-colour joke ever present. But Adam wouldn’t find it funny, and wouldn’t take it as a compliment, either, and so Warlock forced himself to endure the vulnerable silence that followed.

“Are you okay?” Adam asked after a little while. “You didn’t answer any of my texts.”

“I’m fine,” Warlock said on impulse. Then he took a deep breath and actually gave the question some consideration. Adam wouldn’t push him. Adam was painfully respectful of boundaries these days. But Adam had always given him the truth, no matter how excruciating, and Warlock was already curled up so sick and small in this place, he couldn’t stand to hide any further. “I’m… I’m not,” he whispered. “I hate it here.”

“Yeah,” Adam said. “I think I finally understand why.”

*

Warlock was finally asleep, twitching restlessly but unconscious. Adam couldn’t quite switch his brain off yet, though, and besides, he’d never seemed to need as much sleep as other people. 

It shouldn’t be that way -- when he’d remade the world, he’d made himself into a normal 11 year old boy, with no terrifying supernatural powers, who should need a normal amount of sleep. None of it had seemed to go quite as it should, but despite that, he was as much the Antichrist now as Aziraphale and Crowley were still an angel and demon. Which was to say, he was very much retired, even if his exact status was a little fuzzy around the edges. But even so, this was always a bit of an odd time of year for him.

He was never entirely sure if Jesus was his uncle, his brother, or the good half of himself that had been sheared off and shoved out into the world two millennia earlier. 

And right now, he was wondering if Jesus had ever used his powers for evil, just as Adam tried to use his for good (or, preferably, not at all). It would be nice to think they were neutral, just… there, to be shaped by the nature of the person wielding them, but that wasn’t how it felt to Adam. It was more like a voice inside him, like the opposite of a conscience, encouraging him always to follow through on his worst wants and impulses, and if he wasn’t careful it could get him doing things sometimes even without his noticing. Even trying to do the right thing, he’d made a lot of mistakes, because of how hard it was to understand where an appropriate boundary was when you could see right into a person’s soul. 

And though he’d learned not to lean into the weird and controlling tendencies, he’d still had no intention of sleeping by himself. 

He wasn’t over Warlock’s expression when he’d seen what had become of his room, that terrible hurt Adam had caught glimpses of over the last year and a half, that continued to linger despite his best attempts to love Warlock into wholeness. (You couldn’t. You couldn’t do it. He did know that. But it would never stop him trying.)

*

The next morning was Christmas Eve. Warlock went down to breakfast while Adam was still in the shower, in the vague hope of skimming off the worst of the unpleasantness in his absence. Both his parents were already there when he arrived, his mom glued to her phone and his dad walled off behind a broadsheet. It rustled as Warlock walked by to the sideboard.

“Good morning,” his dad said from behind it. It sounded like an accusation.

“Morning,” Warlock replied carefully.

“I said _good morning,_ ” his dad repeated, finally lowering the paper in indignation. Back turned to them, Warlock allowed himself an emphatic eye roll. His dad had been losing his hearing for years now, but refused to admit it. Warlock would’ve had a great deal more sympathy if he didn’t get blamed for it constantly. (Just like he got blamed for everything from not liking baseball or blood sports, to his insistence on getting bullied at boarding school; his entire bloody existence, probably, for as much say as he'd had in that.)

“So did I,” he ground out, forgetting himself momentarily.

“Always muttering,” his dad said irritably, before disappearing behind his paper once more.

“Charming,” Warlock muttered, out of sheer spite. Seemed somebody was redirecting their displeasure over the sleeping arrangements in the least diplomatic way possible. And of course it was only ever Warlock who got that treatment, too.

He sat and ate in silence, scrolling his phone with one hand, fork in the other. It was so fucking absurd, the ceremony they all stood on. What was the fucking point of bodies in a room, when they were just going to ignore each other? And yet, if he didn’t show up, he’d be sure to feel the full force of his parents’ passive aggressive displeasure. Why? _Why?_

He knew why, though, of course he did. It was all about appearances. It always was. They’d eat in the same room and exchange soulless gifts that no one actually wanted, and take a photo by the tree that his mom would put on the wall as evidence of a happy family, as if they didn’t all remember the circumstances that had accompanied the fake smiles. But they were a diplomatic family through and through, and everything was about the optics.

He was almost done, escape within sight, when his mom let out a quiet sigh pitched perfectly to indicate that she was aggrieved about something, but too forbearing to make it a thing.

“Warlock, honey,” she started. Warlock looked up through his hair like he was still a truculent fifteen year old, and braced for impact. “You don’t seem happy.”

 _No… shit?_ he thought. Loudly. Were they really going to do this now?

She continued, “You look thin, you need to eat more."

Oh, apparently they weren't. How very fucking typical of her to ignore the great big thing she was really unhappy about, and pick at him about something else instead. Just like his dad.

"I just ate a full English," he said, falling way short of the light tone he'd been aiming for. Christ, he'd never been good at hiding the heights of incredulity his parents could push him to. He needed to pay closer attention to how Adam did it.

"There's no need to be defensive, honey. I'm your mom, I'll always be worried about you. And you know, it's not just that." She paused for effect, giving him a look of deep concern. "It feels like your-- that-- friend of yours has something to do with it. You’re so quiet this year.”

She… was she seriously implying that Adam was the source of his unhappiness? _Adam_? Was she actually saying that? The sheer bloody-mindedness needed to twist things that way… The injustice of it took his breath away.

Which was probably for the best, because the alternative was spewing out the words crowding at the back of his throat, letting the angry pricks gathering behind his eyes overflow, everything gushing out hot and ugly, blood and organs and splintered bits of him he didn’t want to ever let them see.

Instead, he said, “I’m fine.” And he meant it just as little as he had to Adam last night. But unlike Adam, they didn’t deserve the truth.

*

The gardens were lovely, Adam had to admit, and seeing Aziraphale’s old gardener’s shed was fascinating, the shimmer of miracles-past leaving shadows of books and cups of tea and a pervading sense of comfort. But he wasn’t enjoying himself, because there was Warlock, buried up to his nose in his winter coat, and instead of opening up a little about his childhood with their godfathers as Adam had been hoping for, he was forced to watch him get stiffer and spikier, with nothing he could do about it.

No, that was wrong. Nothing he _should_ do about it. Because he was committed to taking his cues from Warlock, respecting his desire to minimise conflict. This was Warlock’s family, and it was Warlock who would have to face the consequences of Adam doing something he wasn’t ready for. So he would make himself leave off, no matter how hard it was to stand back and let his boyfriend be caught in this gale of disapproval -- battered and small and trying so very hard -- when to Adam, he _shone_.

*

Warlock’s dad seemed to be in less of a mood by lunch time, but perhaps that had more to do with the cook’s boozy melon starter than anything Warlock had or hadn’t done. His mom, too, seemed happy to maintain a flow of weightless conversation, ‘catching him up’ on all his ‘old childhood friends’. Some of them Warlock could barely remember well enough to connect a face with a name, but he supposed it was nice enough. Asking _is that James Andrea-and-George’s son or James from the golf club who won that competition one time?_ was a harmless way of appearing engaged, at least.

“You remember Sarah, Joy and Arthur’s daughter,” his mom continued on. “We’ve just been invited to her wedding.”

“Good for her.”

“Yes, she’s getting married. To a man.”

Well, it had been nice while it lasted. Warlock suppressed a sigh and tried not to rise to the bait. “Okay…”

“I suppose she’s grown out of her experimental phase.”

“Oh she doesn’t have pink hair anymore?” Warlock asked mulishly. He knew exactly where this was going, but he was going to make her say it.

“I meant the lesbianism, darling.”

And there it was.

And Warlock was… going to pick an argument, apparently.

“She’s bisexual,” Warlock said, watching himself with detached horror but somehow unable to stop.

“Pardon?”

“She didn’t _grow out_ of being a lesbian. She was never a lesbian. She’s bisexual. She likes all the genders, always has.”

“Got an answer for everything, don’t you?” His dad now.

“I was only going to say what a relief it was to know there’s still a chance for you to settle down.” His mom.

That hurt like too much cold air in the lungs. “Why… why do you think I’m not settled?”

“Well, you’re only twenty, there’s still time,” she said evasively, but that was blatantly not it. His parents had met as freshmen and gotten engaged by now.

Warlock glanced at Adam in desperation for some way out of this conversation that didn’t end in a shouting matching. Adam looked at him levelly for a moment, that awful, scouring look that Warlock love-hated, before apparently coming to some kind of decision. The corner of his mouth quirked up ever so slightly before he looked away and turned to Warlock’s parents.

“Still time for what?” he asked pleasantly. Both Warlock’s parents looked at him, startled. As though they’d just expected him to sit there and take it. And why not? Warlock always had. Warlock had been silently asking him to, as well, up until just now and whatever Adam had seen on his face. He’d put in so much damn effort trying to avoid exactly this, and yet, somehow, it was a relief.

“They mean,” Warlock said, “still time to find a nice girl.”

“No offense, Adam,” his father chipped in, with his smoothest, most diplomatically insincere smile. “We just want what’s best for Warlock.”

“Actually, I don’t think you do,” Adam said calmly. “I think you want what’s best for you.”

Warlock stared at Adam. Remembered his mother’s smile in the hallway last night. The clothes and the comments about his hair. The insistence that the only use for a Maths degree was a spot at Goldman Sachs. 

Oh.

_Oh._

There was a frigid silence, before Warlock’s mother broke it.

“Excuse me for caring about your lifestyle choices,” she said to Warlock, pointedly ignoring Adam. “But seeing as you’ll never have children, I guess you’ll never understand.”

Warlock teetered on the edge of his realisation, before finally tumbling over.

He put his knife and fork down carefully, finished his mouthful, folded up his napkin.

“You know what?” he said. “You’re right. I won’t ever understand. I hope I _don’t_. And it’s got nothing to do with children.” He stood, letting the chair scrape back across the parquet floor. “Come on, Adam. I think I’m done subjecting us both to this bullshit.”

Adam blinked at him once, then rose silently and came to his side, sliding his fingers between Warlock’s. There was a single beat of his heart in which Warlock looked at his parents and waited for a reaction, an apology, _something_. But all that happened was his father’s eyes dropping to their joined hands, an expression on his face like he’d just tasted something sour.

“Suitcases are in the car,” Adam murmured as they left the dining room. Warlock had never been so grateful for his uncanny, reality-bending gifts. He squeezed Adam’s hand, and Adam squeezed back. “You’re doing the right thing,” Adam said. “I’m proud of you.”

Warlock didn’t say anything. With Adam, he didn’t need to.

*

It was a three hour drive from Wiltshire to Brighton. It should’ve been less but Adam took the scenic route through the South Downs so that they got to watch the afternoon sunset over the hills. Warlock was quiet. Not one of his brooding, anxiety-laden silences, but something angry and ancient that was a tangible presence in the car. But he didn’t cry until they were home, the front door closed behind them and the duvet over his head. Adam made him a cup of tea and gave him the space he asked for, switching on the TV to stare blindly at the beeb’s Christmas Eve specials. Warlock re-emerged some time during Eastenders and Adam heated them a couple of ready-meals, and turned the volume low, so Warlock could talk if he wanted.

“Least you get to do your swim tomorrow,” he said eventually.

“Don’t have to,” Adam said. 

“Don’t be ridiculous, you love that shit.”

It was the annual Christmas morning swim from Brighton beach. It involved dragging them both down to the seafront in the late morning and plunging into the frigid waters of the English Channel with a hundred or so other enthusiasts in minimal swimwear. Adam did, indeed, love that shit. But he’d forgo it for Warlock.

“Love you more,” he said, grinning delightedly around a mouthful of chicken korma at Warlock’s pained expressed and grossed-out noises.

“As if I’d miss the opportunity to spam my Instagram with pictures of your hypothermic body.”

“I’m glad you’re feeling better,” Adam said. It was the kind of thing that could’ve been said sarcastically, but in fact, he meant it. Insults were Warlock’s love language, and he had missed them over the last couple of days. 

Warlock’s eyes slid away. “I was trying to be an actual sodding grown up for once,” he said quietly.

“I know babe. And you shouldn’t have to be, with your own parents.”

Warlock sank moodily into the couch cushions. “I hate everything about this conversation.”

Adam leaned over and kissed his temple. “Want to go for a walk?”

“It’s fucking freezing out there. There’s actual fucking ice in the sea, _Adam_.” Warlock sighed dramatically, and Adam said nothing. “Fine, why not.”

Adam went and got their coats.

*

To say it was freezing cold was, for once, not hyperbolic. Frost glittered on the pavement as they walked, their breath steaming into clouds in front of them. There was barely a breeze, though, and that made it bearable -- welcome, even. The cold air biting at Warlock’s face with little needle-like teeth pulled the ache out of his eyelids. 

“I don’t know what to do next,” he admitted after they had gone half a mile or so, hands tucked together in one of his pockets. 

“Do you have to?”

“I guess not, but should I like, I don’t know, block their numbers until they’ve apologised?”

Adam gave a thoughtful pause. “I don’t really think there’s a ‘should’ in this situation. And besides, if you block them, how will you know whether they’ve apologised or not?”

“Oh that’s easy,” Warlock said. “I’ll send you down to that place you originally came from, and if it’s a bit nippy, that’s how I’ll know.”

Adam huffed out a small laugh, but he was being restrained, Warlock could tell.

“Ugh, out with it. You’re allowed to give me your opinion you know.”

“Am I?” Adam looked delighted, the little shit. Warlock smiled helplessly into his scarf. “Well look, it’s nothing groundbreaking, and I certainly think there’s a benefit to taking some space from them right now, but if you’re ever planning to see them again, wouldn’t it make sense to tell them how you expect to be treated? You know, unambiguously. Then they can’t do that thing where they pretend it’s all okay.”

“That would definitely be the smart thing to do,” Warlock agreed, with the clear but unspoken follow up that he himself was not a smart person who did smart things.

“Can you tell me why you wouldn’t?” And there Adam went, cutting right down to the bone, as always.

“I dunno if you’ll be able to understand this,” Warlock said, “but telling them that I want something is like giving them the tools to… I don’t know, ugh… Right now they have long pointy sticks, and occasionally they hit their mark. If I do the whole talking about it thing with them, it’s like giving them a laser-guided missile. All that happens is I end up completely obliterated, spread like a thin layer of raspberry jam across the Axminster.”

“Vivid,” Adam acknowledged.

“Accurate. Fuck. I can see it all happening just like it always does. We ignore each other for long enough and then everyone pretends it never happened, business as usual.”

“But you don’t want that this time.”

“No! But I… I don’t know how to… _Fuck_. Adam, why the fuck do you want me? I’m pathetic. I’m so… pathetic. I crumble and I hide and I… I don’t cope. With anything.”

Adam stopped walking, forcing Warlock to stop too.

“You’re wrong,” he said. Quiet voice, studied gentleness. “You’ve gone through all of that your whole life and you’re _still here_. Actually that makes you resilient. It makes you so strong.”

Warlock bit his lip, willing the waterworks not to start up again, but it was a losing battle. He fucking hated crying in front of people, even Adam. 

“You are such an arsehole,” he whispered, turning away. “I love you so much.”

Adam stayed quiet, but slung his arm around Warlock’s waist, and didn’t say anything when Warlock swiped angrily at his eyes so that he could get himself under control more quickly. (If anyone understood that need for control, it was Adam, and sometimes it was terrifying, but moments like now Warlock was only grateful for the silent understanding.)

They were standing at the top of the beach, staring out to sea, the waves lapping gently against the stony shore. The sky was dark and clear, a few stars visible through the light pollution, a gibbous moon hanging low on the horizon, fat and bright.

"Look at that," Warlock said, hands clenching up like hedgehogs as the excruciating urge to explain himself came over him. This was Adam, though. He never seemed to mind, or get embarrassed, even if Warlock felt exposed enough for both of them. He pushed on anyway. "It's shattered across the waves like someone dropped it. That's how I feel sometimes. Broken into too many pieces to fix." 

Adam’s fingers twitched against his side, a sign he was thinking through his instinctive reactions, the reflex that always came first to fix, fix, fix. Despite knowing the incredible power Adam was tamping down, Warlock found it oddly reassuring; that he knew this about Adam; that despite appearances, having it all figured out didn’t come naturally to him.

“But you don't look at it and think it's ugly, right?” Adam asked after a moment. “You don't think, oh, what an awful sight. It doesn't look like the moon up there, but it's still… lovely.”

“Huh,” Warlock said, and decided to leave the insults out of it, for now.

*

“Okay, I’m ready!” 

Adam whooped and wrenched his hoodie off, dropping it on the pebbles as he jogged into the sea. It was 11am and a sizable crowd had gathered to watch the Christmas morning insanity.

“Fucking batshit,” Warlock muttered, glancing around. There were maybe twenty others already in the water, and more joining them every minute. Most of them were just sort of paddling around with the water up to their waists, having a nice old chat like it was a social event and not a clinical evaluation of their mental stability. But not Adam, of course. Adam had to dive in head first and go for an actual goddamned swim.

He loved these stupid traditions. Warlock had been appalled to find out that Aziraphale and Crowley had been letting him attend this example of mass lunacy since before they’d even met, and he also had vivid memories of watching Adam careen down an almost-vertical hillside chasing a round of cheese last spring. If there was a stupid tradition available to participate in, Adam wanted to participate in it. Warlock was frankly too scared to ever bring up the burning barrels of Ottery St. Mary.

He scanned through his camera roll until he found a picture he liked, and shared it to the group chat that Adam had named ‘The Ineffables’. _Look at this prat._

Aziraphale wrote back immediately, _Dear Lord, again?_

And Crowley, almost simultaneously, _Nice! Take it your back then_

_Yeah we left early_

_In that case, my dear, you are welcome to come here for Christmas dinner. Once Adam has warmed up again, of course._

Warlock looked at that word, _welcome_. 

Funny how, with them, he knew that he was. Knew that they’d go to the cottage and be accepted for who they were, that he would be considered enough just as he was. He knew they’d eat turkey and probably drink too much sherry and stuff themselves with home made mince pies. There'd be bad jokes and parlour games and Aziraphale getting snippy over place settings. Maybe Crowley would pass out drunk on the couch and accidentally turn into a snake again, or maybe he'd just have changed his pronouns, and definitely Aziraphale would still be gayer than the fairy on top of the tree. Warlock could wear women’s clothes and the only thing that would happen would be that Crowley might ask where he’d got them from. He and Adam might even end up sleeping the night in Adam’s old room, together, and be expected to do just that because they were a couple and that’s what couples did, and every moment, every damn moment of it all would be soaked in love. 

He took a deep breath of sharp winter air, looked for Adam’s ridiculous (beloved) head bobbing amid the waves, wrote _Thanks that sounds great, we’ll be there,_ and changed the group name to ‘Family’.


End file.
